At the time of the Partition of India in 1947, the British abandoned their suzerainty over the princely states , which were left with the options of joining India or Pakistan or remaining independent. Hari Singh , the maharaja of Jammu and Kashmir, wanted his state to remain independent. Muslims in Western Jammu province (current day Azad Kashmir) and the Frontier Districts Province (current day Gilgit-Baltistan ) had wanted to join Pakistan . In Spring 1947, an uprising against the Maharaja broke out in Poonch , an area bordering the Rawalpindi division of West Punjab . Maharaja's administration is said to have started levying punitive taxes on the peasantry which provoked a local revolt and the administration resorted to brutal suppression. The area's population, swelled by recently demobilised soldiers following World War II , rebelled against the Maharaja's forces and gained control ...
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